April 21, 2008

Dominguez draws first blood in Georgia

Toyota-United's Ivan Dominguez took a smart victory in the first stage of the 2008 Tour de Georgia Monday.

While Rock Racing (with Freddie Rodriguez), High Road (with Greg Henderson), and Gerolsteiner (with Robert Förster) jockeyed for position at the front of the field, Dominguez found a good wheel, and just flat outsprinted the field.

Jelly Belly's Nicholas Sanderson was 2nd and Förster 3rd, with essentially all riders finishing in the same time.

Looks more like the Tour Down Under standings, with 5 Aussies in the top 10 and Greg Henderson from New Zealand. The best placed US rider was BMC's Taylor Tolleson, 13th, with Chris Horner 18th. It appears neither Freddie Rodriguez nor JJ Haedo were their team's featured sprinters today: Sevilla in 14th was the best placed Rock Racing rider (Rodriguez in 54th), and McGee led CSC in 7th with Haedo back in 75th.

July 02, 2007

FdJeux, Bouygues Telecom, Credit Agricole confirm Tour squads

At Française des Jeux, Sebastien Joly and Bradley McGee are unavailable, leaving Sandy Casar the team's remote GC hope. Thomas Lovkvist may factor in the young riders' competition, as could Remy Gregorio, a heralded young Frenchman.

Française des Jeux 2007 Tour de France roster:

Sandy Casar (France)

Sebastien Chavanel (France)

Mickael Delage (France)

Philippe Gilbert (Belgium)

Remy Di Gregorio (France)

Lilian Jegou (France)

Matthieu Ladagnous (France)

Thomas Lovkvist (Sweden)

Benoit Vaugrenard (France)

Four rookies: Chavanel, Delage, Di Gregorio, and Ladagnous.

At Bouyges Telecom, former world champion Laurent Brochard, the mullet-est man on two wheels, will miss the Tour.

June 21, 2006

Tour starters: English-speaking countries roundup

Since most of my readership comes from English speaking countries, I thought I would post a quick roundup of which (and how many) citizens of the former colonies are scheduled to ride in this year's Tour.

United States (8 riders, 1 reserve)

George Hincapie, Discovery

Chris Horner, Davitamon-Lotto

Bobby Julich, CSC

Floyd Landis, Phonak

Levi Leipheimer, Gerolsteiner

Fred Rodriguez, Davitamon-Lotto

Christian Vande Velde, CSC

Dave Zabriskie, CSC

Reserve: AmerItalian Guido Trenti

Last year, all of these plus Lance Armstrong and Trenti, but minus Vande Velde.

McGee definitely out of Tour

McGee, who finished last year's Tour, dropped out of the 2004 Tour with back and hip problems similar to those that forced him out of this week's Tour of Switzerland and the Giro d'Italia.

A herniated disc has left McGee unable to ride hard:

"Specialists in Paris confirmed Friday the cause of my sciatica is coming from a small hernia that, under the force of riding, is forcing itself on to the nerve and explaining the grief I have been dealing with these past months," McGee said.

"It seems likely I will undergo surgery in the near future with the hope to be able to return to racing before season's end.

"I feel relieved to have finally located and explained the cause of my difficulties."

June 12, 2006

Nuyens takes Suisse Stage 3 and race lead

QuickStep's 26-year-old Nick Nuyens kept the freshest legs in a late-stage breakaway Monday to take the 3rd stage of the Tour de Suisse.

As a teammate of Paolo Bettini, also in the selection, Nuyens didn't work as hard to make the break stick, and easily outkicked T-Mobile's Linus Gerdemann, Astaná-Würth's Jorg Jacksche, and Saunier Duval's Koldo Gil.

T-Mobile's Jan Ullrich was near the front for most of the day, and he, Bettini, Cadel Evans, Frank Schleck, David Canada, Giampaolo Caruso, and the 4 who would break away formed a superstrong group of 10 with about 20 kilometers to ride.

Michael Rasmussen, Bradley McGee, and Robbie McEwen were shelled by the high tempo, and came in around 4 minutes back.

June 10, 2006

Tour of Switzerland kicks off today

Cycling4All offers a final Tour de Suisse start list. Of course, Jan Ullrich is the biggest Tour GC threat at the race, starting today, but there are a lot of other Tour players involved.

Top sprinters Tom Boonen and Robbie McEwen are here, and are the favorites for the Tour's green jersey this year. Thousand-time (okay, six-time) green jersey Erik Zabel is here, as well, leading Team Milram.

Web streaming coverage is available from Cycling.TV's premium subscription service, where £19.99, or about $37, gets you a full year of racing. Today and tomorrow, subscribers have both the Dauphiné Libéré and the Tour de Suisse to choose from.

May 07, 2006

McEwen rides Milram train to Giro Stage 2 win

Team Milram's Alessandro Petacchi had made no secret of his desire to take today's Giro d'Italia Stage 2, from Mons to Charleroi.

As the peloton approached the finish line, his Milram team executed the plan to perfection, as his teammates slowly fell off, keeping the pace high enough to discourage opportunistic attacks, and launching Petacchi with 200 meters to go.

But today, the sun didn't rise in the East, the roadrunner didn't escape, and Petacchi couldn't finish out the sprint. Instead, Davitamon-Lotto's Robbie McEwen, following Petacchi's wheel, was able to come around and take the first road victory of the 2006 Giro.

T-Mobile's Olaf Pollack (who took the sprinters' points jersey at the Tour of California) was 2nd, Paolo Bettini of QuickStep was 3rd, and Petacchi was 4th. Leonardo "L." Duque of Cofidis rounds out the top 5.

Maybe there's still some life in the old-timers: McEwen is 33, Pollack, Bettini, and Petacchi are 32.

With the sprint finish, there was no significant change in the overall, where Discovery Channel's Paolo Savoldelli (celebrating his 33rd birthday) still leads Française des Jeux's Bradley McGee by 11 seconds, and José Enrique Gutierrez by 13 seconds.

May 06, 2006

Savoldelli takes Giro Stage 1

Defending Giro champion Paolo Savoldelli of Discovery Channel took today's short time trial in Belgium.

Savoldelli was the only rider to covered the 6.2 kilometers in less than 8 minutes. His 7:50 was 11 seconds faster than Française des Jeux's Bradley McGee, and 13 seconds ahead of José Enrigue Gutierrez of Phonak.

Among other favorites, Danilo Di Luca was 10th on the day, at 19 seconds, Ivan Basso was at 23 seconds, Cunego was at :25, and Gilberto Simoni was at :26.

Paolo Bettini, who had hoped to wear the race leader's jersey after Stage 3, came in at 8:32, so he'll need to take 42 seconds out of Savoldelli.

Among Americans, Bobby Julich finished in 8:35, Tom Danielson was in at 8:11, Jason McCartney at 8:21, Phonak's Patrick McCarty, starting his first grand tour, was 93rd in 8:44, and Saunier-Duval's Aaron Olson, likewise starting his first GT, finished in 9:07.

March 06, 2006

Boonen wins Stage 1 sprint, takes Paris-Nice lead

On the other end of the continent, Northern Europe's fastest man took his 8th win of the season, as Tom Boonen's sprint victory put him in yellow at Paris-Nice. Allan Davis of Liberty Seguros was 2nd, and Saunier Duval's Francisco Ventoso 3rd.
Boonen told Eurosport:

"Two weeks ago, when I saw the roadbook, I had [stage one] marked down as one of my main goals," he said after the race. "It was a flat stage which suited me fine even though the conditions made it very hard.
"It was cold, it rained and I'm all the happier to have been able to win in such conditions."

March 05, 2006

Julich takes Paris-Nice prologue

Bobby Julich kicked off the ProTour calendar with a victory, taking the prologue at Paris-Nice on Sunday. Julich won the overall there in 2005, but says that's not a goal for him this year. Julich slipped ahead of Andrey Kashechkin of Liberty Seguros by 1 second, with FDJeux's Brad McGee at 2 seconds. The course is supposed to be very tactical this year, so look out for world champion Tom Boonen, who came 5th in the prologue, only 3 seconds back.

Julich said he's not defending his title:

"I didn't make Paris-Nice one of my objectives this year but in the warm-up of the prologue I felt good and realized I had a chance of doing something," he said.
"At 34 you can't go chasing every race. This year I've agreed with team manager Bjarne Riis that my priorities will be the Giro d'Italia and supporting Ivan Basso at the Tour de France."

July 24, 2005

Vinokourov!

T-Mobile's Alexandre Vinokourov put on an awesome show of force on Sunday, outriding half the field to take the Tour's final stage in Paris.

Breaking away on the last lap of the day, Vinokourov managed to gap and hold a gap to the teams trying to set up their sprinters: Cofidis, Davitamon-Lotto, Liberty Seguros, and FdJeux.

Joined by Fabian Cancellara, then by Française des Jeux's Bradley McGee, Vinokourov put his head down, and countered an attack by McGee to take the stage.

Lance Armstrong, of course, nails down his 7th overall victory in the Tour, and took the podium flanked by his 3 children. He also spoke to the crowd (and TV audience) from the podium, an unprecedented act for the Tour winner.

After some debate, judges awarded bonus time to Vinokourov for the stage victory, which lifted him into 5th overall on the Tour and dropped Levi Leipheimer down to 6th.

Compared to last year's final GC, Pereiro is 10th again, Leipheimer climbs from 9th to 6th, Mancebo improves from 6th to 4th, Ullrich goes from 4th to 3rd, and Basso improves from 3rd to 2nd. New names in the Top 10 this year are Vinokourov, who will certainly keep things interesting wherever he winds up next year; Rasmussen, who owned the big mountains; Evans, who had an excellent 1st Tour at 8th; and Landis, who I felt rode a very defensive Tour, and was never really able to take the attack to the leaders.

July 14, 2005

Stage 11 wrapup

I found myself wanting Discovery Channel to chase Vinokourov down Wednesday: they still had 5 or 6 strong guys on the Galibier, and I think they could have closed a 2 minute gap. Glancing through Bob Martin's Stage 11 summary, though, they clearly did exactly the right thing.

Botero and Vinokourov are potentially dangerous guys, but their damage was contained, and the rest of the field has lost one more day's opportunity to put Lance Armstrong under a hammer. Armstrong's retirement is now 10 stages and 11 days away.

Today, Discovery will mostly work to keep GC contenders out of any successful break: If Basso tries to go off, they'll chase. On the other hand, there are so many riders facing disappointing Tours, and lowly placed, that it shouldn't be hard to find a quality break and let it go. Especially after Vinokourov's break succeeded Wednesday.

Basso, Leipheimer, Valverde, and Rasmussen all sit closer to the race lead than they did yesterday. They had the best days for riders not born in Texas. Unfortunately for them, they're not chasing down Jens Voigt from here on out.

July 02, 2005

Stage 1 updates

Dave Zabriskie @Tour de Georgia ITT

CSC's Dave Zabriskie is the early leader at Stage 1: His 20:51 has held the top place for more than an hour against some pretty good time trialers. Usually, the early times can't stand up to the big boys still to come, but that's a fast time, and should at least rank highly at day's end.

Armstrong is off! He's not wearing the yellow jersey, as he could. He says he only wants to wear the jersey if he's earned it. He pulled out of his pedal right at the bottom of the start ramp. He also had pedal problems at the Dauphiné Libéré.

Brad McGee, another consensus pick to challenge for the stage win, comes in placed 15th. Zabriskie has a shot at wearing yellow tonight.

Ullrich is 42 seconds back of Zabriskie at the first time check, while Armstrong comes through 3 seconds back, or 39 seconds up on Ullrich. Armstrong has a big pink rabbit in sight, and he's closing the gap!

At the 2nd time gap, Armstrong is 3 seconds faster than Zabriskie, and he's passed Jan Ullrich on the road!

"I'll be backing myself over anyone, Armstrong included, to be on top come the close on Saturday."

Given the course profile over the first few days, it's likely that anyone who gets a gap on the sprinters with the best time-trial skills (Thor Hushovd comes to mind) will hold onto the race lead for a while.

Armstrong, meanwhile, described the time trial as "strange".

And the American, who this year is bidding for a seventh Tour win, added: "Although it's only 19km long, it's straight into a headwind so it feels more like 25-30km in terms of distance.

"It's fairly basic but, sure, we'll be going for it to put a marker down."

June 29, 2005

Daily Peloton previews GC candidates

One of the most entertaining web Tour de France reports is The Daily Peloton's Jambon Report, where they award their Golden Hams and Ham-gazers to the riders who ruled and drooled, respectively, during the day's stage.

Today, Locutus has their GC preview up. Some highlights: he thinks Chris Horner "is the team leader, and the team just doesn't know it yet", expects Brad McGee to take the prologue-that's-not-really-a-prologue on Saturday, and thinks Ullrich will lose serious time on the first major mountain stage, as he does every year.

June 13, 2005

McGee takes TdS Stage 3; Ullrich holds lead

Australia's Brad McGee is looking well-prepared for the Tour, as he took a sprint win on Stage 3 at the Tour of Switzerland today. Jan Ullrich continued in the race's overall lead, but McGee now sits just 2 seconds back, followed by Michael Rogers at 18 seconds.

Last year, McGee had a disastrousTour because of back, hip, and leg pain he said were initially caused by planting olive trees at his home.

But unfortunately for him, there was a certain German wearing a certain yellow thingy around today. And "wearing" two great legs too, by the way: Jan Ullrich drove the chasing bunch into Sankt Anton, and poor Koldo was brought back with just 500m left. Then it was time for the sprint, and for Brad McGee to get proper reward for the perfect race he rode today.

There were some notable performances with the Tour de France in mind. Spaniards Iban Mayo and Alejandro Valverde were both prominent in the front group, while Sinkewitz’s Quick Step team-mate Michael Rogers was also up there. Missing, though, was Joseba Beloki, who finished almost six minutes down and is now very short of time in which to rediscover his best form.

June 11, 2005

Bernhard Eisel takes first stage at Tour de Suisse

It was a different kind of Aussie taking the sprint for Française Des Jeux today, as Austria's Bernhard Eisel took the first stage of the Tour de Suisse, ahead of Quick Step's Tom Boonen and Gerolsteiner's Peter Wrolich.

Normally, you expect a stage win out of FDJ's Australian sprint specialist, Baden Cooke, or fellow Australian Bradley McGee, but on Saturday, Eisel rode a long, almost Petacchi-like leadout to overcome Paolo Bettini, who tried to launch a winning move from 350 meters out, and Boonen, who had a very successful campaign through the spring classics.

After the stage, Eisel thanked Cooke for the win, saying Cooke had told his teammates with 20 kilometers to ride that he wasn't feeling strong enough to sprint for the win.

Davitamon-Lotto's Robbie McEwen chose to not even contest the final sprint.

Tomorrow is a 36-kilometer individual time trial that should provide a measure of Jan Ullrich's fitness with 3 weeks to go to the start of the Tour de France.

July 08, 2004

McGee packs it in

Bradley McGee of Fdjeux.com abandoned during today's stage of the Tour de France.

McGee had been having a very good year, and was a favorite to take the prologue, but he's been suffering from back problems since the Tour started, problems he blamed on planting some olive trees at his new home.

He's the second Fdjeux.com rider to abandon, after fellow Aussie Nick Gates.

July 07, 2004

McGee still suffering

Bradley McGee of Fdjeux.com is still hurting from the pelvis injury that left him way off the back in Stage 1. Today, his Fdjeux.com team was caught on the road by Liberty Seguros, who started 5 minutes behind them, and finished last, nearly 2 minutes behind the 20th placed team.

"The warm-up and the start of the stage went really good," McGee told AFP.

"But after the first 10 to 15kms I began to suffer. The team's rhythm wasn't too fast in general but it began to be too fast for me."

Bramati and a few others were dropped by their teams during the TTT, and had to straggle in alone (or in one pair's case, with a teammate). Eddy Seigneur of RAGT was also dropped, but couldn't finish within the time limit, and was eliminated.

July 05, 2004

McGee update

Bradley McGee was able to finish the 2nd stage in the field, after a chiropractor was able to straighten out the back problem that kicked McGee off the back yesterday.

"Thanks to the work of the chiropractor I was a lot straighter on the bike, that's the important thing but unfortunately I still haven't got a lot of power and so I couldn't help Baden Cooke in the sprint and I was just another number in the main field ... I'm a lot happier now and should be okay to carry on," he said.

McGee could be the Tyler Hamilton story of this year's Tour, if he can ride back into the conditioning he showed in the Route du Sud.

July 04, 2004

McGee: "I can't go on suffering like that"

BBC Sport reports that Brad McGee's problem is with his back, but it manifests itself in his hips and legs:

"My back is just cut in half and I can't feel my legs. My feet are numb and I can't get any power out.

"I'm going to get it looked at and try and find out more, but I can't go on suffering like that."

McGee said his hips are "out of place and are falling in and out of where they are supposed to be, and today they were definitely out.

If McGee drops out, the record Aussie contingent, which was slated to be 10, would be down to 7, after Matthew White's accident before the prologue, and Nick Gates finishing outside the control on today's stage.

June 26, 2004

McGee: I'm targeting the 2005 Tour

Australia's Brad McGee of fdjeux.com has had a very strong year, taking the Route du Sud last week and finishing 8th in the Giro, and believes he's developed into a rider who can compete for the GC in the Tour de France.

"Going for overall victory next year is the goal, and a very realistic one at that," he told BBC Sport.

"I don't know about winning five in a row though. That takes a very special rider."

For 2004, he's looking to take the prologue, as he did last year, and is targeting the time trial up Alpe d'Huez.

McGee has made some progress battling the blood sugar problems that plagued him during the 2003 Tour.

After eating while riding, his body has often produced too much sugar, which in turn causes his blood-glucose level to dramatically drop later on.

But he has since hired a dietician and the problem has not once occurred this year.

"It's hard enough going up those mountains without that sort of thing happening," said McGee. "When it happens it causes me to lose up to 15 minutes on a stage. I'm just grateful it's not happening anymore."